The present invention concerns a process for reduction of the body weight of overweight humans and domestic animals by administration of creatine as well as the use of creatine for the manufacture of a medicament for use in this process.
Overweight of humans and domestic animals is very common today, particularly in industrial countries. For instance, in the industrial countries, every second to third person is overweight. Overweight constitutes a considerable health hazard and very often leads to secondary diseases such as high blood pressure, arteriosclerosis, diabetes and diseases of the joints. The treatment with medicaments such as appetite depressants is very often accompanied by health hazards and unpleasant side effects and therefore unsatisfactory. There is therefore a need for a process with which the desirable weight reduction can be attained without the side effects and hazards connected with the use of centrally active appetite depressants.
Creatine [N-Amidinosarcosine; N-Carbamimidoyl -N-methylglycine; N-Aminoiminomethyl-N-methylglycine] is a natural substance predominantly present in muscle tissue of the vertebrates. Minor amounts are contained in the blood and brain. In the muscle, the greater part of creatine is present as creatine phosphate. Creatine phosphate plays an important role in the muscle as energy storage. In the working muscle, creatine phosphate with adenosine diphosphate (ADP) under the influence of the enzyme creatine kinase yields adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and creatine. In the resting muscle the reaction proceeds in the reverse direction. Intensive muscle contractions lead to exhaustion of the creatine phosphate depots and therewith to the known conditions of fatigue. Creatine is not synthesized in the muscle, it is transported into the muscle via the blood stream, partly after synthesis in the liver and pancreas and back resorption in the kidney, partly after food intake. Creatine is excreted via the kidney as creatinine.
From WO 94/02127 it is known that administration of creatine in a daily dosage of at least 15 g to 30 g, corresponding to 0.2 g to 0.4 g per kilogram of the body weight, in physically active test persons, e.g. athletes, leads to an enhancement of body weight, wich results from an increase of muscle mass. The same effect of creatine is described by R. Sahelian in xe2x80x9cCreatine, Nature""s Muscle Builderxe2x80x9d, page 28, Avery Publishing Group, New York (1997) and by G. Gremion in the publication, xe2x80x9cLxc3xa4uferxe2x80x9d (1995), 8, pages 39-40. In these publications is additionally mentioned that beside an increase of the muscle mass the fat mass is decreased, but finally always an increase of body weight results.
However, the influence on body weight through creatine in the sense of a weight increase depending on an increase of muscle mass with simultaneous reduction of fat mass described in the above literature, only appears together with simultaneous high muscle strain, i.e. e.g. in athletes who are in tough performance training. An influencing of body weight by taking creatine without simultaneous strong muscular strain has hitherto not been described.